An International (archeological) Emergency

  Do you remember a few years ago when an 'international archeological disaster' was being reported on the news as giant stone budhas over a thousand years old were being destroyed by the artillary shells of the Afghan Taliban. Archeologists, historians and lovers of art the world over were horrified at the destruction of the giant works of art. Even fundamentalist Muslims, Jews and Christians who could see the logic behind 'the ridding of idols to honour the first commandment' were later horrified when they found that the true motive was realy part of a prolonged persecution of all Afghans holding an 'indo-chinese' ethnic tribal origin.

Nevertheless, the archeological damage had been done and an artistic treasure had been lost. How would you feel if you were to learn that another -mostly unexcavated-archeological and cultural treasure, filled to the brim with countless untapped clues and answers on the very roots of western civilization pre-dateing nearly all of the worlds great civilisations is now also about to be destroyed forever? But this treasure is not being threatened by the Taliban or the Khemer Rouge, but by a European government that was prepared to secretly plot against, undermine and change the laws of it's own constitution just so it could destroy one of the worlds oldest heritage sites for a short term financial gain.

  This threatened 'treasure' due for imminent distruction is a royal city of temples, palaces, tunnels and royal tombs far older than Egypts 'valley of the kings'. In fact, before the Egyptians were even considering building their own 'eternal' resting places and gateways for their kings and Pharoahs, this nation already had it's own highly developed advanced culture and society of kings, priests, poets ,'scientists' farmers,workers, soldiers and slaves.It was among the first nations in the world to build huge (and very accurate) astronomical observatories. It was making detailed, complex and accurate maps carved into huge stones at least four thousand years ago-some have even been dated to between 6 to 8 thousand BC. It was the first nation to introduce 'a written language' to europe and had been making complex gold jewelry, ornaments and artifacts long before the Egyptians discovered how to do it.

  It was a nation that had enjoyed many 'golden ages' and archeology has shown it to have been one of the richest nations on earth at many points throughout it's ten thousand year history. Many historians have also argued with an increasingly informed conviction that the maps, directions, and discriptions given by ancient Egyptian priests to the Greeks of antiquity that described a rich and scientificaly advanced nation beyond the 'Pillars of Hercules' could have only refered to this one specific nation. The surviving greek maps and descriptions once compared to and overlayed against this nations ancient city layouts do bare an incredibly striking resemblance and the first known indiginous histories of this land also describe the original inhabitants as having all been destroyed in a great flood just like the Atlantis of Greek legend. There is a strong likelyhood that many of the Sciences attributed to early Egypt way well have been learned from and shared by these sea farers as they traversed ancient trading routes.

  The problem is, that even though this ancient city has never once in it's history ever been properly or fully excavated by any true professionaly trained or academic archeological teams, all of this valuable evidence and its countless answers to the true roots of europes history are being needlessly and scandilously bulldozed, and, unless immediate action is taken, it will be lost to the world forever. The current distruction ( which has left all the worlds top academics utterly dismayed as well as everyone with even the very feintest tinge of a Celtic linneages) is happening right now in the Republic of Ireland and is the result of an ongoing deliberate five year plot to change and manipulate constitutional laws, originaly designed to protect such treasures, so that now they can instead be used as a means to destroy them.

 The plot first began to reveal itself in the latter half of 2003 when Duchas, the Irish organisation in charge of protecting and maintaining the nations heritage sites was controversialy disbanded by the then minister for the Environment, Martin Cullen.

Then , in a political move surprisingly reminiscent of Senator Palpetines menouverings in the Star Wars trilogies, Minister Cullen successfully smuggled in an 'ammendment ' to the 1930 to 1995 National Monument Acts granting the minister the right to demolish any monument if it was deemed by the minister to be "in the National Interest" , but the terms for defining the 'national interest' lie totally in the hands of and at the descretion of whoever sits in the seat of the 'Minister for the Environment's chair'.

 Once full power was in the hands of Mr Cullen permissions began to be given regularly for the NRA (National Roads Authority) and the construction industry (the main financial contributers to irish political parties) to demolish and remove from the map, any building or monument falling in their way. Mr Cullen was then 'promoted' to being 'The Minister of Transport' after clearing the way for a new 'motorway infrastructure' to be built through the middle of this ancient complex, meeting place and seat of the celtic kings. But Ireland, riding on the crest of a financial wave that has brought in a new Golden age of riches and international success, is on the verge of crashing it all into the rocks due to the shortsightedness of these plans.

 The planned infrastructure is designed to support the economic boom by creating a motorway system to serve and cut journey times to the nations cities and to serve the capitol with a new set of junctions giving greater access to the ever growing population of commuters from beyond Dublins city limits. Even though most people agree that the nation needs to modernise the current infrastructure, this particular plan, especialy with regards to the Dublin traffic problems and the Skyrne valley motorway section (where it is about to destroy an enormous slice of Irelands, Europes and the worlds heritage) is seriously floored due to the following reasons.

  Firstly, the Skryne Valley section being built to relieve congestion is not ever going to succeed in its stated goal as it merely transfers the traffic congestion from one area to another a few miles away. Secondly, one of the biggest problems with regards to traffic congestion in Dublin is not just due to access into and out of the city, but due to the roads in the city itself - many with hindsight from the UK would argue that the M25 around London did nothing to ease traffic in the city centre, if anything ,it made the problem even worse. Thirdly, the Skryne valley section was started without out carrying out an environmental impact assessment which is a legal requirement for all EU nations and fourthly, this particular section is clearly not in the 'National Interest' and is destroying a unique and valuable heritage site which, if properly excavated and managed could easily have netted the Irish Government up to a hundred times the cost of the current road . Re routing the motorway and using funds collected from developing the 'Tara' complex as an 'intact' top quality World Heritage site could also have saved struggling Irish commuters hundreds or even thousands of Euros a year (-under the current profiteering plans the National Roads Authority aims to recoup the costs through making access to the motorway subject to all motorists paying a toll ). Finaly, the planning of the new 'transport' infrastructure deliberately failed to look at or consider alternative modes of transport to and from the city - making commuters even more reliant on the 'motor car' as the only plausible choice . Many of the local rail networks that were slowly closed down since the seventies are still intact and would require little maintanace to make them operational again as a cheeper and greener alternative for both the State and commuters.

  But still the 'Palpatinian' plot continues to march on and to manipulate and trample underfoot any other voice or thinking apart from it's own - regardless of the requests of more educated and informed professionals or even the 'European Senate'.

  And... just as was once the case in Star Wars ( and Nazi Germany) on the 30th of April 2007, as the new Minister for the Environment and 'Heritage' Dick Roche officialy opened the works for the new motorway at a glittering press conferance,

Democracy in the Republic of Ireland officialy died to the sound of thunderous applause.

  But what none of the applauding spectators knew as they cheered was the fact that a major new international archeoligical find had been discovered a month before directly in the path of the proposed motorway. Even the mostly untrained archeologists employed by the NRA to 'smooth the programs way ' had begged Minister Roche for the new find to be given a protected national monument status. Mr Roche not only refused , but kept the find a secret until after the works had 'officialy ' began. The find itself was truly remarkable and was the remains of an enormous wooden 'Henge' similar in design and layout to the UK's Stonehenge only far, far greater -covering an area the size of three football fields it is (or was) the largest Henge of its kind in the world. The works continued until international protests led to the courts intervening. The eventual ruling by the high court was that the discoveries should be preserved 'by record'.Unfortunately, in laymans terms, this actualy means just measured, 'photographed', dug up and put in a wharehouse until the NRA and the 'Ministry' decides wether to dump them, or donate or sell them to the worlds museums.

  But where many of the NRA's archeological team were untrained subcontractors with no expertise in this area , many vital pieces were being destroyed and abandoned in the 'waste away ' piles by diggers and heavy machinery to the dismay and disgust of the many archeologists and museum curators who may have one day benefitted from the artifacts. They were not being fully excavated to 'preserve by record' but to 'prepare for road building'. The distruction of this site was ordered by minister Roche on June 30th 2007 despite the launch of legal appeals. Another site close to Dublin was found to be a historic Royal Graveyard - a genuine 'valley of the kings' over 4,000 years old. Again this site was to be 'preserved by record' and again many of the clues and contents were destroyed or damaged by the improper use of heavy machinery. After a few pieces were removed and some photos taken of the exposed graves of the nations royal ancestors the whole site was secretly bulldozed at 4am on the 4th of July 2007. How ironic that a nation that had struggled for so long to preserve its own national identity and culture against a foe once so determined to destroy it should, within a century of recieving their dream, themselves set about destroying the remains of that unique celtic identity -and on the day when the descendants of the million who escaped the impoverishment, hunger and persecutions of colonial rule, celebrated their own shared cultural freedoms in 'the new world'. Meanwhile, back in Lismullen and the Skyrne Valley (- on the 'route ' containing the hidden secrets and remainders of europes heritage at Tara -) , ancient artifacts unique to the world were again recieving the standard vandalistic treatment as stone souterains freshly uncovered containing artistic treasures and more giant map stones (similar to those at the Newgrange monument) are now again being destroyed to the shock , horror and despair of every historian , archeologist and amatuer with even the slightest understanding of what is at stake. For those of you wandering about the true nature and significance of some of these finds here are a few examples of the mysteries that a detailed excavation could illuminate and solve... Firstly , the discovery of the wooden Henge at Lismullen predating the UKs Stonehenge indicates an eastward migration of ancient Irish culture from Ireland into the the rest of the British Isles and on into the continent prior to the mainstream Celtic migrations that made significant adaptations and advancements to those original designs before themselves following the very same migratory and 'cultural' routes.

  Secondly, a large swaythe of the modern understanding of celtic cultural practices comes from Roman writings and 'war propaganda' that deliberatly set out to describe the celts as a kind of ancient Al Quaida - only far worse -to secure the support and funding from the Senate...and for Romes generals, being at the head of a well funded and supplied military success was one of the key stepping stones on the way to becoming The Emporer. The subjugation of the celts was Romes primary goal in conquering western Europe but the more the empire conqured and advanced, the more they learned of this sophisticated Ancient Capitol in the islands far to the west.Yet by the first and second centuries AD, the Romans had come stunningly close to reaching their ultimate military goal. Recent excavations in the United Kingdom centred around and to the north of the Roman city of Chester have discovered the largest ever military base and deep water port ever built by the Romans outside Rome.

The more that archeologists uncover the more certain they are that the fortifications were actualy an assembly point for what could possibly have been the largest ever assembled Roman invasion force in history.Writings found by Roman Generals based in Britain leading up to the time also give clear evidence of the scale of the materials, supplies, manpower and planning involved. The Irish, who were regularly raiding Roman Britain and Europe and frequently taking it's citizens as slaves, would also have been well aware of the details of the plan, and would have been closely watching each new arrival by land and sea. Less than a decade after completion the bases and the port it suddenly became seemingly abandoned without any clear historical explanation and though some Roman artifacts and possible 'Forward posts' have been discovered in the Dublin area, no one actualy knows if the planned invasion was ever mounted. One thing is certain, wether due to severe weather conditions in the Irish sea, or an utter defeat at the hands of the Armies of The Tara High kings, or even if to pestilence or to desease, Romes final push to conquer the Celtic Empire completely failed - and the answers to this new found UK archeological mystery will most undoubtedly lie unexcavated somewhere in the planned route of the Skyrne valley motorway...

  Taras Eye copyright by Steve Cooney (vocals surprisingly by Liam O'Maonlai -and not Bob Dylan)